Jacqueline Smith: Put away those scarlet letters and act grown-up

Published 11:38 am, Monday, March 19, 2012

In the ongoing heated debates about women's reproductive rights, a central fact has been getting overlooked -- along with basic civility.

Many, many people -- some women as well as men -- have been saying they shouldn't have to pay for birth control pills. Well, they don't!

The federal health-care plan calls for insurance coverage of birth control, not that taxpayers reach into their wallets to pay for someone else's monthly prescription.

I can just hear the retort, that eventually everyone pays for insurance. But does this mean, then, that those who pay insurance premiums get to decide what is covered for others? Let's opt out of paying for Viagra and such prescriptions, then, which have nothing to do with medical necessity and everything to do with sex.

But that's not the way it works. Nor should it. We can't have individuals dictating what they believe should be covered. What if, for example, someone thinks an experimental drug used to fight cancer is too expensive? Or antibiotics are over-prescribed?

Including birth control for women in insurance coverage makes absolute sense.

Why is this even part of the political dialogue?

The surprise -- the shock! -- is that discussion of health coverage has turned into derision of sex. Female sex.

I haven't heard anyone calling men four-letter words for interest in sex, or, let's say, for getting prescriptions for Viagra. Which is covered by many insurance plans.

But, as is widely known now, when a college student spoke at a Washington hearing a few weeks ago in support of low-income women having access to birth control coverage, bloviator Rush Limbaugh labeled the graduate student a "slut" and a "prostitute."

And as if that wasn't bad enough, he continued that if she wants to have sex she should videotape it so that everyone could watch. What?????

Limbaugh's crude remarks get excused as coming from an entertainer, if one can honestly call his radio talk show entertaining.

There is no acceptable excuse to turn time back decades, or centuries, and belittle women. Scarlet A's are no longer in fashion.

And let's face it, if women use birth control to manage pregnancies, generally there's a man involved. Right? So she's a "slut" and he's ... just being a man?

Give me a break.

The brouhaha is cast as political -- conservative Republicans framing the health issue in First Amendment terms and Democrats courting the female vote by blaming Republicans.

But this is more than an election-season duel.

I find it very troubling that women's rights are so shaky that one issue can rip through the social veneer and expose the underlying bias.

Now, I can just hear the whining about what's all the fuss over Rush. Last year comedian Bill Maher called former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin a c***. Is it acceptable for liberals to use such language, but not conservatives?

No. There is free speech in this country, but that does not mean all speech is eloquent. There is free speech in this country, but that does not mean women -- any woman -- should be dismissed with a pejorative.

Abhorrent speech is answered by more speech. That is my purpose here. Some women answer with humor, and you can find that in effective parodies on YouTube.

Send the scarlet letters back to another century. Women need not -- and will not -- put up with such treatment now.